This study aimed to illustrate the grasp of consciousness through the concept of division. A male child, aged 6 years and 4 months, learning the basics of the language at a private school in Recife, was interviewed and requested to represent a problem. A qualitative analysis was carried out observing 5 moments of grasp of consciousness: 1) the absence of consciousness of the totality of all the elements; 2) the consideration of the totality of all elements, without being conscious of the others; 3) the appearance of cognitive conflict as a means to enable the consciousness of the relationship between the terms; 4) resolution of the conflict by a pre-existing cognitive scheme - the absence of consciousness of the rest; 5) the representation of the term rest, without the consciousness of its relationship with the others. The results showed the building of different degrees of grasp of consciousness of division, enabled by the examiner's interventions and by the presence of referents in this statement, beyond the reach of the grasp of consciousness.